Egypt painfully familiar ground for President Obama

President Barack Obama insisted Monday that he isn’t taking sides in the standoff between Egyptian President Mohamed Morsi and millions of protesters who’ve taken to the streets to protest his policies.

But that’s not likely to be enough for many in those angry crowds, who seem firmly convinced that the White House has bolstered the Muslim Brotherhood leader, even as ordinary Egyptians — and some in his own Cabinet — have grown increasingly dissatisfied with his rule.

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Egypt: What options does Obama have?

Obama on Egypt clashes

As the Egyptian military issued what appeared to be an ultimatum Monday for Morsi and the opposition to sort out their differences within 48 hours, Obama found himself in a painfully familiar place — facing questions about whether the United States has, once again, invested too much in a helpful but flawed Middle Eastern leader while paying insufficient attention to burgeoning popular discontent.

It’s the same set of questions that dogged Obama throughout the Arab Spring, when he wrestled with the dilemma of precisely when to ditch a string of besieged leaders, from Libya’s Muammar Qadhafi to Egypt’s previous president, Hosni Mubarak.

“Our commitment to Egypt has never been around any particular individual or party,” Obama said Monday in Tanzania, the final leg of his week-long Africa trip. “Our commitment has been to a process.”

The president acknowledged that the United States had worked with Morsi. But, he suggested, that shouldn’t be mistaken for enthusiasm about his rule.

“The U.S. government’s attitude has been we would deal with a democratically elected government,” said Obama. “Democracy is not just about elections — it’s also about how are you working with an opposition?”

Obama’s comments about Morsi seemed decidedly less effusive than the praise the Egyptian president won from the White House last November, when an official statement credited him for his “personal leadership” in helping to broker a halt to fighting between Israel and the Hamas-led government in the Gaza Strip.

Just a day after Obama publicly thanked Morsi and “reaffirmed the close partnership between the United States and Egypt,” the Egyptian leader triggered another round of widespread protests by announcing a decree that granted himself virtually unlimited power.

Now, some analysts believe the administration may have had too much faith in Morsi as a “practical” leader who could satisfy Islamist elements in Egypt while managing both the opposition and the economy.

Obama administration officials “were more inclined to give [Morsi] and his movement the great benefit of the doubt and also to see that there was no practical alternative to keep Egypt at least stable,” said David Pollock of the Washington Institute for Near East Policy.